“It will connect entrepreneurs with investors. cmypitch.ie provides businesses with the unique opportunity to upload their own video pitch onto the secure platform, for a registered network of investors to watch and inform their investment decisions. In addition, entrepreneurs can learn how to become “investor ready” by watching video tips from the best Irish (e.g. Eddie Jordan, Ray Nolan) and international (e.g. Doug Richard, James Caan) entrepreneurs and by downloading the best ‘how to’ guides.
For investors, cmypitch.ie has the potential to open up all of Ireland’s best investment opportunities and makes identifying the most attractive deals more efficient. Investors can save valuable time, allowing them to not only assess the business opportunity but also the people behind the proposition. Pitches can be filtered by size, sector and rating – all key considerations for investors. Investors can also receive email alerts when a new pitch is added that matches their preferred criteria.”
cmypitch.ie will also hold regular offline pitching events called “cmypitch Live”, where entrepreneurs get the unique opportunity to pitch to a room full of investors. Events like these will offer entrepreneurs the opportunity to complement their video pitch with more traditional face-to-face pitching and networking.
cmypitch.ie has been endorsed by some very successful Irish entrepreneurs: Eddie Jordan (F1), Philip Lynch (IAWS, One51), Patrick Brazel (former Chairman of Irish Software Association), James Morris (Windmill Lane, TV3) and Tony Kilduff (Kindle).
cmypitch.ie has already signed several partners: Bank of Scotland (Ireland), Deloitte, The Irish Times, Microsoft and William Fry.
The inaugural Techcrunch Europe Award nominees have been announced and there are plenty of Irish companies in there. It’s a public vote, so head on over and keep the flag flying for a lot of great apps and businesses.
The awards are particularly gratifying because there are so many businesses that are new to me in the list. The entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in Europe. Now if only an Irish VC could dazzle everyone and become worthy to join the 2010 nominees.
The Irish are (and let me know if we’ve missed any):
Collab is a simple, easy to use, free online tool to help bring ideas and skillsets together. If you have an idea and you need to find a person or people to work with you or if you want some feedback on a project you are considering collab is for you.
Posting the ideas to Twitter is a nice touch and allows those who are actively looking for projects to work on to keep an eye on what is being suggested.
If you like Collab, why not help the push and write a blogpost yourself?
“I'm particularly impressed that roughly 70% of available European mobile handsets are capable of using Locle at the moment. Since it doesn't strictly rely on GPS falling back to Cell-ID for most handsets it means that, theoretically, if you were wanting to deploy a location based social networking service in, say, India (for example), the first thing you should do is call up Pieter at Locle and do a deal with them.”
Ties in with Ron Conway, godfather of Angel investing in the valley – and his new “investment theme” – persistent/real time data. As per Techcrunch piece“has a goal to invest in 40-50 companies in the next 18 months. His focus will be companies exploiting real-time data, which he calls the next billion dollar market opportunity. Conway is already an investor in Twitter and Facebook, two companies solidly in the real-time space.”
This is the sort of news I love reporting. We now have an App School in Ireland. Over the course of 5 days you can learn how to build iPhone Apps. Run by SQT Training, Patrick Collison and Damien Mulley, this will give you all the skills you get to get your App built and launched. At only €1500 for the week, that’s a bargain considering how much traditional programming training courses cost. The first course is on in the Castleknock Hotel Dublin from July 20-24.
One of the best courses I ever did was back in 2006 when Ryan Carson presented his one day workshop, “A-Z: How to Build a Web App”. Because it wasn’t just about tech but also about all the pitfalls in trying to launch an App, it enabled us to avoid many common mistakes. My sense is that App School could do the same.
As I said on Twitter earlier, I believe that iPhone & Android development could be to techie teenagers what the ZX Spectrum, C64 and BBC Micro were to my generation. I am what I am today because I got a Speccy when I was 14. I taught myself Basic, Forth and Z80 assembler. I even had games published in magazines. Imagine being 15 years old and having people download your App from the iPhone App Store or Android Market. The buzz!
I want to see the next generation of people coming out of technical course in third level education with at least one mobile app and one webapp in their portfolio. The days when Java skills got you a job in a bank are over.
Well done everyone involved in getting App School launched. Looking forward to seeing what the Alumni develop.
The Press Release on the IQPrize has just gone out and the important bits are as follows.
Decisions For Heroes (Robin Blandford) A web application that saves lives by helping rescue teams record and analyze their rescue operations and training
GetitKeepit.com (Alan Coleman) A web application to help consumers declutter their lives by offering an online portal for the management and retention of important documentation
MyHotel.ie (David and Matt Sherlock) A website and booking engine that reinvents the traditional booking model, offering hotels a powerful new marketing channel with no booking fees
Neurosynergy Games (David Delany, Lorraine Boran and Michael Boran) Innovative online brain training application designed to enhance both intellectual (‘IQ’) and emotional (‘EQ’) performance for healthy people and people with specific mental disorders
Octopied (David Behan, Ronan Morris and Michael Flanagan) A web application for freelancers, helping them manage invoicing, project management, sales and support through one simple and cost-effective tool
Our Writers' Bloc (Owen Gallagher and Karl Quinn) An online marketplace that connects self-published authors directly with their readers, and facilitates the distribution of material over multiple formats including mobile phones and e-Reader devices
Pendle House (Michael Furey) An online currency exchange marketplace that allows companies and individuals around the world to trade currencies directly with each other, cutting out all transaction costs
Plink (Mark Cummins, James Philbin) An image-driven search engine that allows users take a photo of an object with a mobile phone, and automatically retrieve information about it online
On July 8th, the final candidates will make a Dragon's Den type presentation to the judges, followed by a public event where the candidates will be able to make a short elevator pitch to the audience. The People's Choice Award of €1000 and the Grand Prize of €10,000 for the overall winner will be announced at the end of the night.
To add my 2 cents as a judge, I was honestly blown away by the quality of all the biz plans I reviewed. I expected that there’d be lots of badly thought-out, lunatic fringe stuff but I was completely wrong. 90% of what I read could make a feasible business.
Selecting the final 8 was bloody difficult because there were so many great ones submitted. I fully expect to see a ton of those who submitted plans running highly successful businesses over the next few years. I hope they all go straight to their County Enterprise Board or Enterprise Ireland and give them the same plans they sent us.
I don’t know who will win the prize but those 8 businesses could easily generate €100m+ revenues between them.
Here’s hoping IQContent are getting non-stop calls from EI and the CEBs to get access to all the other fantastic plans.
29th of June 2009 by admin
25th of 
